Capital Punishment: Mitigating Factors in Light of The Biopsychosocial Model

- This blog has been authored by Anmol Yadav. The author is 3rd year student of B.A. L.LB. (Hons.) at Faculty of Law, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi.  In the complex discourse surrounding capital punishment, the consideration of mitigating factors becomes paramount, particularly when viewed through the lens of the Biopsychosocial Model. This interdisciplinary framework, encompassing biological, …

Justice in Courts of Inquisition? The Delhi High Court on UAPA Remand Extensions

A person should not be condemned without knowing why. One would think that this precept is not a point of debate in the legal system of a constitutional, democratic, republic. After all what personifies the shift from a culture of impunity and subservience to one of justification than the ability of individual citizens to ask …

A Not So ‘Fair’ & Lovely Criminal System

-Sofia Dash & Ahan Gadkari Introduction The recent Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act, 2022 (“CP Act”) has spurred nationwide debates amongst human rights activists and the government officials. The CP Act, which aimed at replacing the archaic Identification of Prisoners Act, 1920,permits law enforcement officers to collect identifiable information of all convicts, arrested persons, and detainees, …

Procedure in the Trial of Counter/Cross cases

-Nehaol Sri L V Two criminal cases with conflicting versions arising out of the same incident are called as counter or cross-cases[2]  These cases represent opposing views of the same incident happening at the same time and space, and are usually seen at the level of trial courts. There is no standard definition or procedure …

Envisioning admissibility of wearable devices in Indian Courts

Rishabh Saumya and Gayatri Singh Introduction The leap of technology from our desk to our wrist is quite remarkable. From measuring our heartbeat to calculating our footsteps, wearable devices, gradually, are becoming an essential fitness accessory among health-conscious folks. These activity tracking devices are equipped with wearable technology and are marketed for their health tracking …

Stand-Up Comics & The Imbroglio of Criminal Complaints

By Arundhati Rajput Introduction Vir Das, an Indian Stand-up comic, has yet again become the center of vehement criticism as his monologue: ‘The Story of Two Indias’, has stirred opposing sentiments. In this monologue, the comic portrayed India in a sagacious manner having an undertone of satire. However, several lawyers and political leaders felt that …

‘Miniscule Fraction of The Total Population’: Not Entitled to Legal Marriage and Protection from Abuse?

-By Prachi Agrawal & Charu Sharma Introduction: Namesake Recognition In the years antecedent to 2018, same sex carnal intercourse, regardless of consent, was considered against the order of nature and was weighed at par with bestiality, i.e. sexual intercourse between humans and animals. Under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 [hereinafter ‘IPC’], it …

Some Thoughts after Diving into Prisons Data and Emerging on the Other Side

-By Abhinav Sekhri The National Crime Records Bureau [NCRB] runs the annual Crime in India reports as well as the Prison Statistics India reports. Both get their yearly moment in the sun when, around their publication, news stories with attractive pie charts get published with infographics to show that an unearthly number of cases are pending …

‘Fit State Of Mind’: An Argument for a more Objective Test for Recording Dying Declarations

-By Esha Goyal Section 32(1) of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 allows for a dying declaration in the form of a statement regarding the cause of the declarant’s death to be made a relevant fact. The criminal rules of practice of each State in India require the declarant to be in a ‘fit state of …

End of Justice? The Supreme Court’s Order in Hitesh Verma v State of Uttarakhand

by Prannv Dhawan & Ishwar Singh The Supreme Court’s recent judgment in Hitesh Verma v. State of Uttarakhand [decided on 05.11.2020] reversed an order of the Uttarakhand High Court and quashed the case with respect to allegations under SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989 (‘the Act’). The Court held that insulting or intimidating a person belonging …

Juxtaposition of IP and Criminal Law

-By Namrata Pahwa Introduction When the products of any brand are authentic and original, it receives a considerable amount of recognition in the minds of its prospective buyer. It is important to preserve the market integrity of any product sold by such brands and that protection is granted by the product-related intellectual property rights, i.e. …

Preliminary Inquiry Before FIR: A Panacea for Malicious Prosecution?

-By Saisha Singh Earlier this year the Delhi High Court, in the process of hearing a case about registering FIRs against BJP Leaders, who have delivered alleged hate speeches, which are being said as being instrumental in inciting violence in NCR, was seen reminding the police to follow guidelines as established by the case of …

Privileged Evidence under S.123, Yashwant Sinha v. CBI and Beyond?-Part II

-By Sudev Singh This is the second part of a two-part series. In the first part the author throws light on the case of Yashwant Sinha v. Central Bureau of Investigation, more popularly referred to as the Rafale case. An attempt has been made to highlight the importance of this case in the context of …

Privileged Evidence under S.123, Yashwant Sinha v. CBI and Beyond?-Part I

-By Sudev Singh Introduction - Background of the Controversy Yashwant Sinha v. Central Bureau of Investigation, more popularly referred to as the Rafale case involved a bundle of petitions, pertaining to the purchase of Rafale Fighter aircrafts by the Indian Government from France. Opposition parties and leaders alleged that the deal entered into by the …

The Three Justices’ Bench decision in Tofan Singh

-By Abhinav Sekhri This past week, a Three Justices' Bench had rendered its decision in the Tofan Singh reference [Crl. Appeal No. 152 of 2013, decided on 29.10.2020]. To recap, the reference had two questions placed before the Three Justices' Bench:  Whether an officer of the central / state government investigating a case under the …

The Irrationality of Section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872

-By Anshul Ramesh and Andolan Sarkar Introduction Confessions play an important role while deciding on the future course of action that is required to be taken by the police and also while securing the conviction of the accused. Sections 25 and 26 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (“Evidence Act”) proscribe the admissibility of confessional …

The state of undertrial incarceration in India

-By Vidushi Gupta Introduction Prisons and correctional facilities are an essential component of the criminal justice system in India. However, very little attention is paid to the state of the Indian prison system. Particularly neglected is the group comprising undertrials within these prisons. The issue of undertrial prisoners in India first came to light in …

Need for exclusion of evidence obtained through entrapment in India

-By Gunjan Shrivastav https://reischlawfirm.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/When-Can-the-Entrapment-Defense-Be-Used-in-a-Criminal-Case.jpg In this blog, it is argued that any evidence obtained by the police by way of a trap should not be admissible in a court of law. In the absence of any specific provision that restricts the admissibility of evidence procured by way of trap, the court should adopt an approach …

Repeated Refusal of Wife: A Mitigating Factor?

By- Oshi Priya Introduction India reports the highest number of acid attacks in the world with the least number of convictions. The graph of crime against women has seen an exponential rise in the past century. Acid attack, though not gender-specific, yet targets women in most of the cases. This crime is often used as an …

Misogyny In India: A Virulent Form Of Hate Speech

-By Tania Gupta Over time, our supposedly egalitarian society has nourished misogynist attitudes and beliefs and pushed ideologies that glorify the speaker as a maverick but inflict hatred on women for being as unfortunate as they are, to be women in men’s world. The laws that govern Indian women are dictated by social perceptions formed …

Locating Female Nudity in the Socio-Legal

-By Nirvani Bhawsar and Karshin Malik Recently, Rehana Fathima who is a women's-rights activist from Kerala was booked under Section 13, 14 and 15 of The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (POCSO), Section 67B (d) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (I.T.Act) and Section 75 of The Juvenile Justice (Care And Protection …

Sting Operations In India: Reliably Admissible?

By- Aditya Kumar Singh The Indian Evidence Act, 1872 has a strict distinction between fact and evidence, and for any document, electronic record, or oral testimony to become evidence and be considered during the final adjudication, it has to first satisfy three pre-conditions in evidence law, which can be formulated and structured as three doors …

China forces birth control on Uyghur Community: violation of International Law Principles

By Divyanshu Gupta Introduction In a recent report prepared by Adrian Zenz titled ‘The CCP’s Campaign to Suppress Uyghur Birthrates in Xinjiang’, it has come to light that China is forcing Uyghur women, a Muslim ethnic minority population in Xinjiang, to be sterilized and take birth control measures to curb its population. Adrian Zenz is …

Criminalizing Genetic Discrimination in India

By Sangita Sharma & Sayan Chandra Introduction Genetic Discrimination has acquired the platform for techno-social discussion for quite sometime now especially with the advent of life insurance companies excluding patients from their policy based on their genetic pre-disposition to any particular health condition. Such an act hits the basic tenet of rights of equal treatment …

The ‘othering’ of death row prisoners and their victims: two sides of the same coin

By Ashna D. Introduction Most societies perceive the rights of accused persons as diametrically opposite to the rights of their victims, and our society is no different. In January 2020, the central government urged the Supreme Court to issue ‘victim-centric’ guidelines in death penalty cases, suggesting that the present framework adopts an overly ‘accused-centric’ approach. …

Criminal Law Reform — Many Misgivings, and the Long, Uncertain, Road Ahead

By Abhinav Sekhri Introduction The Indian law school experience revolves around the idea of submitting "projects" or "assignments". At the start of the 5-year marathon, many of us used to be petrified about the idea of failing to submit the assignment beyond the "Last Last Day" — the last permissible date for handing in the …

Criminals and Their Society: A Peek Into the Abode of a Criminal Mind

By Tanya Hasija Is society more to blame for crimes than the individuals who commit them? Crime makes up an unfortunate part of our society. While not all of us are prone to committing crimes, a number of us find ourselves grappling with the question: what is right and what is not?  The understanding of …